


The Stars Welcome Him (With Open Arms)

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Pre-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Stars, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Is Obsessed With The Stars Because I Said So, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, iron man yes tony stark not recommended, overly poetic bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 00:04:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20182936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Tony Stark yearns for space.He gets what he wants, of course.He gets what he wants at the price of (half of) everything.(or, i type out the word 'stars' a billion times)





	The Stars Welcome Him (With Open Arms)

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the line 'the stars welcome him with open arms' from the song "Home" by Cavetown.
> 
> I decided that Tony Stark would become infatuated with the idea of outer space and it all went to hell from there.
> 
> This isn't like, well plotted writing, this is just me angsting over a weird interpretation of the TSCU/MCU (tony stark cinematic universe stans kudos to y'all lol) because I'm like that haha
> 
> Also if you're one of my irls (you know who you are) you better leave kudos :))

He has never been sure why he yearns so fervently for outer space. 

More precisely, he's never known exactly where it's the freedom or the fatality. The possibility of leaving the cage that is Earth, or the chance of death wrapping its claws around him and claiming him as its own. 

-

Ever since the day he was born, Anthony Edward Stark has reached with desperate hands towards the stars. To him, the depths of space mean escape. Mean something different, something new. It's the chance of more, and the chance of _better_.

-

Better than what he has, what he's stuck with, what he's chained to.

What he strives to break away from.

When Howard Stark dies, Tony gets a taste of that freedom, but at the price of his mother.

The pain stings and cuts but he craves the ache of loss. Craves it because it's better than the apathy his father always handled him with. Pushing Tony away with disdain, distaste, detaching himself from his own child. Always blocking his son out, always keeping him at arm's length or further still. But now the new pain eases his mind, sharpens his senses razor thin. 

And the stars?

They promise more of that same clean-cut clarity. That same dazzling feeling of taking flight. 

-

His second taste of freedom comes with Iron Man, of course. 

With the escape from that cave of torture, a trial run of the hell Tony would be sure awaits him if he believed in any sort of god. This time, it comes at the price of Yinsen. Someone who meant more to him in those months of pain spent together than his own father had meant to him for 21 years.

Tony Stark's beginning to realize that the stars seek to take everything from him.

He wonders, briefly, why he can't bring himself to care. 

Cheating death is second nature now, quicker and easier than falling asleep.

The arc reactor in his chest a constant burden, a reminder that he's on a path to the sacrifice of everything.

Stane's betrayal worms its way into his head and his heart, turning him paranoid, afraid, helpless.

The poison of the palladium, creeping its deadly way through his body. Claiming him slowly, yes, but claim him it will.

Yet through it all, Tony dances in the arms of Death, a treacherous, lethal waltz. To his own horror, it's absolutely fucking thrilling. 

-

He meets the Avengers. Assassins, a god, science experiments gone both right and wrong. They're all batshit insane in their own special ways, and somehow the closest thing he's had to friends in a long time. Sometimes (most of the time) they terrify him, but they all set off that familiar feeling in his heart, the sharp relief that can only remind him of the stars, and this-

This, he thinks, means they're okay. Because that pain? It's always brought him one broken, shaky step, one rung up the ladder, one desperate drag of his body closer to the stars.

And he'd do anything to be closer.

Reaching with both arms yet spiralling again, pulling, straining, and the pain is _different._

More unpleasant, muddling his thoughts and clouding his mind. Drowning him, suffocating and all-consuming in its merciless path of destruction. Panic attacks, PTSD, he's launched into a whole new world of pain and he hates that it's blocking him from the stars, snuffing out their light and strength. 

Once again, something is blocking him from the stars, leaving him not in the freedom of space but on the bathroom floor. Trying desperately to not reach for a knife or a gun and end it all, rocking back and forth and curling into a ball, praying that it'll all end. Praying for death even though the concept of his own mortality, the possibility of his heart stopping, is like a mild-mannered insult, so impotent it's almost laughable.

-

The vision Tony sees in Sokovia burns ice-cold.

It's leaving burnt trails, scorching through his mind, like ice and fire and the pain of the stars. He's screaming but it comes out silent. Not even the cave that he doesn't let himself think of scared him this much, not this deep, bone chilling fear. It's terrifying, and so close, creeping up behind him. Just like the stars. Twinkling as his fingertips brush but hands never grasp.

He's dying.

He's scared

He reaches out for the stars and comes back with devastation, disaster, and destruction in his arms going by the name of Ultron. 

Oh hell, has he fucked up. 

There's a murderous AI loose on the world, and Tony would make a joke if it weren't for the fact that JARVIS was gone, JARVIS, J, his baby, his most prized creation.   
  
Ultron killed him.   
  
_JARVIS,_ he screams when he wakes from nightmares.

And for the first time, JARVIS isn't there to comfort him.

Of course, Tony fixes it. Or at least he tries. He's trying, god, he is, but the stars have never seemed so far away than in this moment, faced with the betrayal and fear on his friends' faces, etched into their expressions, plain as day.

The mistakes he's made, reflected back to him in their faces. Reflecting in sharp spikes, shrapnel bits of anger like the twisted pieces of metal that were in his chest, their disappointment and quiet disgust cutting just as deep.

It's never been this bad before. He's been betrayed more times than he'll ever be able to count, been the betrayer a fair few times as well, but never like this. Cold, brutal, unforgivable.

-

Then, the so called 'civil war' happens, and Tony doesn't think he's ever wanted to die more than this moment. The moment where he genuinely tries to fix the mistakes he's made in his bloody past, right the wrongs in his history of carnage. 

He tries so hard to fix the mistakes he made during his attempt to fix the first mistakes, and receives nothing but disgust in return. Tony regrets what he did, accepts the consequences of his actions, and tries to fix it. 

And somehow he's only made things worse. So much worse.

If this is the price the stars demand, if it’s the payment Tony Stark will have to relinquish, he’s not sure he can do this anymore. He’s not sure how he _ ever _ thought he could pay. Bruce and Thor are long gone, the giant and the god out of play, and he’s not sure if he’s grateful or not. 

He is, because the side they'd have picked would never be his.

He knows, deep down, what they'd do.  
  
He can't bring himself to say it out loud.

Wilson. Barnes. Ant Man (he's not sure where they picked that one up.)

Wanda. Clint. 

_Steve._

Once, he thought he could love that man. Tony sees now, sadly, that it was never in the cards for either of them.

-

It's a slap to the face, a bucket of ice water to the head.

A bullet to the knee, a knife to his throat.

Tony takes the pain and gets back up. Starks are not, have never been, and will never be quitters. They know only to get up and keep going, so that's what he does as his mechanical heart quietly shatters.   
  
(Secretly, Tony doesn't know anything but to get up and keep going. He's not sure how to just _stop_ anymore.)

The war is bloody and it is brutal. Locking up his friends and others that he might have befriended in another life, all of it hurts him beyond words.

Natasha, dancing from side to side like a spider, only thinks of what's best for herself while Tony struggles to keep everything from falling apart. He can't help but be fucking disgusted and hurt by their opinions of him, because _fuck,_ do they think he wants it to be like this?  
  
Do they think he wants to tear the team apart, shatter what he _thought_ was friendship apart? To force them to sign documents that possibly have the risky of forcing them to be at the beck and call of a likely toxic government?

No.

All he wants, all he's ever wanted, is to keep civilians safe from the carnage of the wars they wage on those opposing humanity. All Tony Stark wants is to protect the people who are unwittingly, inevitably, caught up in their battles for the ‘greater good’.

It would be amazing, of course, to not feel guilty for something just once in his life. Tony knows, of course, it'll never be an option as long as he's living and breathing. He reflects, sometimes, on how he got here. So far from everything and everyone he's ever cared about, and so, so alone.

He wonders, sometimes, whether he'll find the stars again.

-

Peter Parker is a blessing in the unassuming package of a fourteen year old boy. Something about his childish, yet intelligent presence brings out the emotion and caring that Tony’s working so hard to suppress. To shape and mold and deform into an impenetrable mask, a shield stronger than vibranium.

He doesn’t think he’ll ever be sure what he sees in the kid. Whether it’s the stars he sees in Peter’s eyes that he’s drawn to protect, or the boy himself. Peter’s so innocent and young but already a better person than Tony could ever hope to be.

What prompts his decisions nowadays, Tony doesn't know. His mind's spiralling, in a different space, and he can no longer seem to communicate what's happening to his mind.

He doesn't have anyone to communicate with either. 

Rhodey worries him, because Tony knows the man’s putting on a brave face. But he can see the stars threatening to draw him away, wrapping bright tendrils of light around the colonel’s legs. Tony pulls back with leg braces and technological miracles, and he thinks he’s winning the vicious game of tug-of-war. And yet it’s brutal and harsh and the rope is fraying and close to tearing apart-

-

Sometimes, Tony flies high, stupidly high. Him and the Iron Man suit, together and alone. Just so he can see the stars, even though they're still a million miles away. It's idiotic, but he likes to pretend that they're within reach.

-

He takes good care of the kid, as best as he can at any rate, and tries not to wonder if this is what his life will accumulate to.  
  
Tony decides then and there that making sure Peter's safe and alive?  
  
That will be the only truly good thing he'll ever do for this world. 

-

He fails that too, and he can see the boy breaking just like he broke.

-

They’re in the park together, him and Pepper, and no one else. They’re happy, and ready to get together, and go out for dinner. He loves her as much as his broken mechanical heart can, so he thinks that this will be okay. 

Therefore, it makes perfect sense that his life as Iron Man should come slamming in at terminal velocity. And it comes in the form of his old friend Bruce Banner, a freaking wizard that he’s almost sure used to be a reputable surgeon, and _ Thanos. _

Thanos is coming from the stars, and for the first time – just the tiniest little bit – Tony hates the bright, impassively twinkling lights of space.

And there’s a fight, as always, and he loves the feeling of thrilling danger, the promise of drawing closer to the stars. But it’s not with Thanos himself, no, just ugly cronies that are, admittedly, stronger than he’d hoped, and he feels the familiar beast of fear stirring inside him.

It’s what’s after, though, that counts, what happens, what he does. Impulsively, to save the wizard (or so he tells himself) he’s-

He’s in _ space _ . Tony Stark is in space, and the stars aren’t out of reach, they’re all around him, and he’s so terrified that he doesn’t have time to see that yes, he’s made it. Yes, he’s here.  
  
Touching the stars.

Unexpectedly, the kid’s here with him, and Tony tries to not lose his shit because he can see all too clearly the same worship for the galaxy he’s always felt reflected in Peter’s eyes, and it scares him. God, it scares him. Tony’s worked too hard to make sure the kid doesn’t go down his path of destruction in search of a flighty goal, he’s put too many of his few good parts into the kid to lose him now.

But he’s in space-

_ Maybe he’s finally made it? _ _  
_

And yet there is still more work to be done. Miles to go before he sleeps, a poet might say. 

They’re on Titan now, and it’s all he can to not scream in joy. To not laugh and sob because it’s _ thrilling _ to have made it. He’s here, he’s finished, the stars are tight in his grasp-

Why is he still incomplete?

Why is he still missing pieces? The stars, they were meant to fill those gaps in his soul, why are they still empty, _ why- _

_ Focus on the mission. _

They fight Thanos, and Tony lets himself hate, because Thanos is the bastard who took his life away, years of it, in that stupid purple hand. Thanos has been in his nightmares for six horrible years and he’s fucking sick and tired of having his every living, breathing moment plagued by that monster. 

Alas, they’re not close to defeating him at all. 

In fact, they’re a million miles away.

Thanos leaves of his own free will that day on Titan, because that stupid wizard goes back on his bullshit about protecting the stone and gives in to the mad beast’s demands.

Tony wants to punch him in his stupid smug face. He blames the wizard and absolutely can’t at the same time and it’s hell.

But in the end, it doesn’t matter because-

_ Snap. _

-

Dust and ashes. 

The only thing left of Peter Parker.

The only thing left of half the universe.

Tony’s reached for the stars, but he’s left with nothing but dust. 

He’s stranded.

Everything he ever loved has finally been taken from him. 

_ At least, _ he thinks bitterly.

-

At least he’s with the stars. 

**Author's Note:**

> So, hope you enjoyed two thousand words of bullshit. If you actually did, thank you! Kudos are appreciated, comments even more so <3
> 
> Additionally, on the off chance one of you beautiful people out there actually follows my writing (unlikely, but hey gotta have high hopes), I know this is a short, plot lacking mess. I apologize, and I've been working on two different works (both a bit longer and far more interesting) that should be published by the end of the summer, if I have any hope.


End file.
